


Page seven

by Kitcat300



Series: Getting rid of the Future's [3]
Category: Timeless (TV 2016)
Genre: Alternate early season 1, F/M, Flynn doubts the journals honesty, Flynn tries to use his words, He really needs to take lessons, Lucy doubts a lot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-22
Updated: 2021-01-22
Packaged: 2021-03-14 13:54:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,004
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28921668
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kitcat300/pseuds/Kitcat300
Summary: Trying a new tac, Flynn has been trying to make contact with Lucy in the present.  He needs help to decide what he should do with his newfound doubts about the journal and only one person can help him but Lucy's not exactly his number one fan.  If he invites her to a meeting in the past will she show?  If she shows will she help him or turn him in? And what exactly is on page seven of the journal?A continuation of a random thought stream about what might happen if Flynn realised the journal given to him by Future Lucy would lead him on a self destructive loop forever.
Relationships: Garcia Flynn/Lucy Preston
Series: Getting rid of the Future's [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2088423
Comments: 3
Kudos: 14





	Page seven

**Author's Note:**

> I had an idea. I ran with it and this is what happened. It's not perfect. It's not intended to be a rewrite of season one. It's just my random thought on how to get rid of that awful scene in Sao Paulo.
> 
> All errors are my own. Most especially the typos in which I excel. :)

Six pages. 

Was that enough?

He’d been tempted to risk it after three but after the debacle at Castle Varlar it seemed more prudent to wait. 

Every muscle screamed, permanently tense. Waiting. 

Would she show? 

Even in the criminally awful uniform, the subtly offensive swastika pinned to her chest, Lucy had been a sight to see. The look on her face when he’d intercepted her. The stain of colour on her cheeks. The righteous anger. That fleeting fear. 

The way his heart had picked up because she was close. 

The loathing in her eyes was nothing more than he deserved. Nazi’s. God help him. Once he might have been able to argue that the journal showed the way, but now..? Now he had doubts. It lied by omission. It instructed in vagaries. It pushed him towards the very worst of himself, left an unpleasant taste in his mouth, left him wondering how much of this was his choice, how much the other Lucy’s design. 

No. There was no defence for his actions. He’d made a choice, seen an opportunity and taken it.

He might never feel clean again. 

Lorena and Iris were still gone. Would it have been worth the shake of Herr Commandant’s hand if they’d been there when he got back? Would it have been worth the Soviets muscle flex if he’d handed over Von Braun? Their winning the space race? The unrecognisable future to which he returned? _A future with his girls in it._

The questions chased each other faster and faster, an endless game of ‘what if’.

The other Flynn, old Flynn, would have been able to answer those questions with a clean conscience and without a doubt in his heart. Too bad he’d died way back when. It had been easier to meet his eyes in the mirror.

Only one thing was true. The journal was a map. But also a curse. The future written in the past. All smoke and mirrors. If he’d never read it would he have gone back to Germany? Unlikely. But he’d also never have known about Rittenhouse’s involvement in rocket propulsion systems, how it had used their launch platform to infiltrate NASA at its highest levels. He wouldn’t have had a chance of stopping them. Wouldn’t have had the chance to save his girls.

 _“You won’t get your family back.”_

It haunted him. Was other Lucy right? Was she lying? If he followed the direction her writing led he’d manage to bring down Rittenhouse somehow – not if this Lucy kept stopping him he wouldn’t – but never get them back. Never see Lorena smile again. Never hear Iris giggle. Never feel the strength in her small arms as she locked them around him. 

So what should he do? Follow where he was led or jump to different points in history? Trust what was written or rely on his own research to identify Rittenhouse agents? Surely he could find a way to use the information he had to his own advantage. Or was that what the other Flynn had done? Just enough to get him killed. More than enough to ensure his demise. It was like slow acting poison. He knew he was dead but wasn’t quite sure how long it would take.

A movement drew his attention. A small figure trying to be smaller, hunched in on itself, hesitating by the door until finally they pushed forwards. The shock of yellow she wore made her hair look darker, the white of her gloves like snow dancing on the material as they moved in front of her, but she’d straightened herself up.

“Lucy.”

She stood carefully away from him, close enough that they could speak privately, far enough away that she’d have a head start if she needed. Those clever eyes of hers looked everywhere and nowhere, searching for the trap, looking for the danger. Were there too many people in this corner of the bar? Too few? 

He expected an excuse but she offered none; didn’t plead, didn’t speak until, “I could have brought half of the Las Vegas Police Department with me.”

He quirked an eyebrow, felt his mask smooth into place. “Did you?”

Shrugging, she strode forward a step until her nerve deserted her and she shuffled to a stop. Another darted look around. Her discomfort – uncertainty – turning her voice to a half-whisper. “Why?”

Did he pretend not to understand? Play coy? Did he offer a sarcastic comment or fling back her abject denials? The angry ball inside of him wanted any of those responses; all of them. The two Lucy’s blurred together. She’d come to him. She’d told him his future. Given him his path, no thought for the man who’d died a thousand times a day until that point, would die a thousand times more each day he lived and they didn’t. Yet here she stood; younger, fresher, unaware. 

Honest? 

If the other Lucy could pass off lies so well what was different about this one? 

“That’s vague Lucy. You can do better.”

She flushed, her eyes sparking. The way she pushed back her shoulders, pulled up her spine, made his mouth quirk. Now this Lucy, she was something else.

“Why did you ask me to meet you here?”

The devil on his shoulder rode him hard. “So that we could talk of course.” He could feel the muscles in his face rearrange themselves, feel the slick smugness moulding and shaping him. 

The way she ground her teeth was audible, her voice like frostbite but sweeter. “You risked Wyatt shooting you because you wanted a chat?”

“Funny. I can’t see the golden boy.” Flynn deliberately scanned the room, checking off his people as he went. “Did he get lost by any chance? Or did you just get bored of his two topics of conversation?”

“He’s a better man than you could ever be!”

It was true but it stung. “And yet, he’s not here.”

Her whole face tilted forwards as she observed her toes. The moment pulled on him; back to waiting, back to not being certain what happened next. Then her head raised and she looked him square in the eye. 

“How do I know you didn’t write those pages?” He didn’t answer. This was a one woman show. “You could have forged my handwriting. You could have researched Varlar before we arrived.” She turned her back on him, took two steps away, before spinning and marching back. “And Nixon? You couldn’t think of anything less inflammatory? Al Capone? What? Are they heroes of yours or something?” If it wouldn’t have drawn too much attention he was sure she would have stamped her feet. Or pushed her finger into his chest. He worked hard not to smile. “What could you possibly hope to gain from sending the entries to me? Now I know what you’ll be targeting and it will easier to stop you.”

The tone of her voice had changed, the certainty slipping away. Never slow, the flaws in her own arguments were becoming increasingly apparent.

Flynn withstood her scrutiny. He resisted the urge to run a finger under his collar as his blood began to heat. Would she see what she was looking for? Would this be the moment she understood what he’d been trying to tell her?

“I asked about Rittenhouse. No one has ever heard of him.”

“It’s not a him. It’s a what.”

Her brown hair shook in denial. “You’re a liar.” He opened his mouth to point out that he’d never lied to her but she cut through him on a hiss. “A murderer.”

In the black and the silence and the blood and the glass. In his heart beating on while theirs had stopped. In the heat that drenched him as he ran knowing all the while they grew colder. His fault. It was his fault. He brought this to their home. He should have been the one to die. He might as well have pulled the trigger.

No. 

Rittenhouse. This was all Rittenhouse and Lucy was the key to stopping them.

“Rittenhouse murdered my family.” It was his turn for ice.

“You-”

“They killed my family and when they didn’t kill me they settled for framing me for their murders.” He wanted to shake her. He wanted her to feel, to understand, what he was saying. “I was supposed to be out of their way. But I’m not. So they sent you.”

She scoffed. “You’re saying the government is Rittenhouse?” 

“No. But some of its employees are.” He let the idea latch into her brain. “I was NSA. My work was security cleared but they knew the moment I found their name.”

“So it was a mole? A double agent? Well I’ve met Ian Flemming and let me tell you-”

“This isn’t a spy novel Lucy.” He hooked her arm and pulled her closer. “This is people’s lives.”

She pulled hard, trying to dislodge him. When that didn’t work she bristled to her full height and glared. “You think I don’t know that? You’re the one waltzing through history changing things any which way you like. And for what? To upset some fictitious Rittenhouse?”

“To stop them.”

“From what?”

They were drawing more attention than he would like. They would draw a lot more if he dragged her through the doorway behind him kicking and screaming. He had to stay calm. Marshalling his features Flynn released her arm and caught the fractured reflection of the man he used to be out of the corner of his eye.

There had to be a way to get her to believe him. “I found their name linked to vast amounts of hidden money. Money they were pouring into Mason Industries.”

“Oh, so now Connor Mason is Rittenhouse too! You need help.”

“I don’t know what Mason is or isn’t but I know he built them a time machine.” He clicked his tongue. “Two, in fact.”

Lucy paused, her mind racing a million miles a minute, each and every thought chasing the next across her face. It was obvious she was trying to argue but failing to find traction. “So this … Rittenhouse bought a time machine and were planning..?”

“Does it matter what they were planning? With a time machine at their disposal they could do virtually anything and we’d never know.”

That caught her attention. At least until what she’d been told fought its way back to the surface. The two opposing ideas she’d been given were engaged in pitched battle.

“So … what? I believe you and then..? Or I remember you’re a crazy, homicidal man and I’m next on your list?”

He could plead, he realised. If it helped his cause he would. The thing was, he didn’t think it would. There was already far too much emotion flying around.

“You walk away.” He didn’t have a smile left in him. “If I wanted you dead I could have left you in Tombstone. There was no reason for me to get on the train other than to help you.”

Lucy’s war continued, a constant back and forth. And then, “You sent me the journal pages for a reason. To get me to meet with you?”

Flynn’s teeth flashed briefly. “I could have found an easier way to orchestrate an encounter.”

“To get me to trust you.”

“How’s that working for me so far?”

“Then what? What do you want from me Flynn? Why the words instead of bullets, the pages that arrive in my mail box? Why tell me exactly when and where you would be before you even jumped to 1962?”

“Because I need your help.”

She rolled her eyes. “Yes. To take down the shadowy organisation that no one has ever heard of.”

“No.” He held out the next journal entry before him. “I need your help to understand what you wrote about Abraham Lincoln and Ulysses S Grant. And, if you’re that way inclined, you could help me sort out whether saving Lincoln would be the best course of action.”


End file.
